Postcards from a Prep Room

We are Jan, Cheryll and Mary. We hugely enjoy our work as science technicians in a secondary school and sixth form centre in East Sussex. We are also inveterate fidgets and ‘fiddlers’. That is to say we enjoy making things and if they happen to fit in with the science curriculum in some way this makes us doubly happy. We would like to share all our ‘found’ things that we have garnered from our meanderings on the internet and our attempts to combine disparate ideas together. As scientists, we are always looking for ways to create resources that help explain natural phenomena. As aesthetes, we like to do this in the most appealing way possible. Along with Mary’s innate ‘Wombling’ instinct and within the confines of school budgets this has often led to some unusual and, dare we say, crafty results. Do put the kettle on, brew up, and enter our Prep Room of mini-wonders and craftological geekery. Lab coats are not essential. Any opinions expressed are ours alone.

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Hunt for Stomata (Reprise)

After the splendid discovery that stomata may be viewed directly on some plant species, we cast about our prep room for leaves worthy of further investigation. Our old staple triangular is oxalis looked like a good bet. Here is what we saw:

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Bright Sparks! Brighton Science Festival

So lovely to spend yesterday with so many enthusiastic young science explorers. Their task with us was to create a marvellous hair-do for our trolls using chromatography of felt tip ink. Some beautiful results were hung up to dry.

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Hunting for stomata

Stomata can be viewed directly on the leaf using a plant species called Tradescantia under a microscope. This one is ‘Violet Hill’ but using ‘Zebrina’ also works! This handy tip came from Chris Everitt on Preproom.org.

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The prep room has had an oxalis triangularis brightening its window sill for many years now but this morning we discovered a mutation! And a particularly sweet one at that, being all heart-shaped and emerging from the flower stem. Must be the company it keeps…

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A post to mark the passing of Sir Harry Kroto on 30 April 2016. One of our technician team was a chemistry undergraduate at Sussex University in the mid-80s and attended his lectures. At around this time Professor Kroto had been looking at a mysterious spike in the mass spectra of clouds of gas in interstellar space. This led to the discovery of a carbon cage and its analogues named the Fullerenes. The spike itself was showing the presence of a species containing 60 carbon atoms. The new allotrope of carbon was named Buckminsterfullerene and the discovery led to the Nobel Prize in Chemistry being awarded to Curl, Kroto and Smalley in 1996.

This model of C60 was made using PHiZZ units, put together by sixth form student Kyle. There are 12 pentagons and 20 hexagons. Each carbon atom in this arrangement is in an identical environment to every other carbon atom resulting in a single spike on the mass spectra.

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The heaviest metals in our Felt Cube Periodic Table were completed today; showing our appreciation for the Lanthanides and Actinides.

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Periodic Table Felt Cubes

Possibly our biggest crafting project to date, we have completed a periodic table with each element represented by a felt cube. Each cube has the full name of the element, the element's symbol, its atomic number and its relative atomic mass. The f-block elements, the lanthanides and actinides, are to follow.

These will be on show tomorrow at Bright Sparks, part of a range of events organised for the Brighton Science Festival where we shall also be taking part in activities for participants.

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A short time-lapse video showing the difference in the densities of water and ice. One of many excellent entries in the Royal Society of Chemistry’s ‘Classic Chemistry Demonstrations’ by Ted Lister. A little powdered food colouring is added to water that is frozen into ice cubes. We used a 1 litre measuring cylinder here and poured in some cooking oil. Slide in the coloured ice cubes, if they sink to the bottom, too much food colouring has been used; they should bob on the top. As the ice melts, water sinks through the oil and collects at the bottom. As well as being visually arresting, it's a great way to discuss polar ice melt and climate change.

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The school will be throwing open its doors to current Year 6 children on 1st October between 6.15 - 9pm. In those few short hours the school gives a flavour of what to expect as an enrolled student and the science department is never short of things to see and do for its visitors. This year we are going for a magical theme…

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Fred the Magnificent has acquired some knitted grey matter. Go Fred!

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End of the Academic Year

Another busy year for the science department comes the end. Good luck everyone for results day. The science garden has had a good innings this year with lots of strawberries but the woodlice beat us to them!

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Adding to the list of crafting techniques for our science displays, a rope using French knitting has been artfully employed to explain electromagnetic waves. In the visible part of the spectrum, the seven colours are used. Elsewhere, we have illustrated the powers of ten to give a sense of scale. Left to right, Ben Nevis - Sherlock (radio), bumble bees (microwaves), a plant cell (infrared), bacterial cultures (visible), a water molecule (ultraviolet), the Helium atom (x-Rays) and a strange quark (gamma). At the base we have used the mnemonic 'Radioactive Mice Invade Venus Using X-Ray Guns' to help recall the order.

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A fun way to look at the major organs in our bodies. The knitting patterns can all be found on the CLEAPSS website.

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Smoke but no mirrors...

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Seeing the Light

Making a spectroscope with just card, scissors, tape and a CD at Bright Sparks as part of Brighton Science Festival. Suddenly the world looks very different!

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Jack Frost - The Recrystallisation of Sodium Thiosulfate

We love to show the pretty things that happen in our prep room; this practical is used in A Level Physics to demonstrate the latent heat of fusion. Solid sodium thiosulfate is melted completely in a boiling tube and then the liquid is allowed to cool to around room temperature. When a few solid crystals are added they create nucleation points for the liquid sodium thiosulfate to recrystallise to solid. If you hold onto the the boiling tube while this happens, it gets noticeably hotter as the thiosulfate solidifies. Why is this happening? Consider that in order to melt the solid, heat energy is applied until it changes phase completely as all the intramolecular bonds of the solid, between the individual ions, need to be broken in order to become a liquid. In the reverse action; when the liquid returns to solid, bonds are being formed so where does the excess energy go? Heat energy is released. In this case, demonstrably so. It also happens to be a very aesthetically pleasing process as seen in this short clip.

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Now you see it, now you don't...